


Doubt

by AlterEgon



Category: Armageddon (1998)
Genre: Gen, Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-24
Updated: 2013-12-24
Packaged: 2018-01-05 22:05:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1099121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlterEgon/pseuds/AlterEgon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>That night before the mission, Harry and Truman share their lonely watch in that dark room.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Doubt

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Clone](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Clone/gifts).



> Dear Clone,  
> Here's a tiny little Armageddon story for you.  
> I hope you enjoy it.

Even in the silence that descended on them after the boys had long gone to enjoy the last night before their mission and the new meteorite had been spotted, as he and Truman were waiting for news of the impact, Harry never shed his calm, competent face. He was far too afraid that he would be unable to put it back on when he had to if he permitted doubt to crowd into his features as it had already swamped his thoughts.

He had no illusions about their situation. Success of the mission they were about to embark on was questionable at best. It was a wild, desperate plan, based on calculations with too many variables that were only half-known. Some of those variables were the very people their outcome would depend on.

There was enough insecurity about drilling into the bottom of the sea for oil. No one knew that better than he did. He had witnessed spectacular success as well as equally spectacular failure there. He had seen terrible accidents as well as incredible elation.

At least, he assumed, if they messed up this time around they'd be going down fighting, snuffed out reasonably quickly instead of caught in a death-trap like everyone else on the planet, twiddling their thumbs and waiting for the inevitable end to come catch up with them.

He relied on his men every day that they were working together. He would have trusted each and every one of them with his life, and the life of his daughter. Every one of them, including always-nervous, chaotic Rockhound, whose random demeanor concealed a brilliant mind. Including A.J., who had come so close to stealing Grace from him. Who was stealing Grace from him even now.

Oh, if they prevailed, if against all the odds they made this work and came back unscathed, he might even give the two his blessings.

But before that they would have their little adventure in space.

He had watched the preparations, the scant training his men had gotten, with growing apprehension. A.J. too hot-headed, too intent on proving that he was Harry's match when he should have been focused on saving the planet. The others too nervous, at times missing simple steps and often-practiced actions that they should have been able to perform blindfolded and with one hand tied to their backs.

He could hope that they would be back in prime shape once things got serious, once they were on that piece of rock and working for real. He could hope that routine and focus in the work at hand would take over then, that it was knowing they were in a practice situation that had caused the mess-ups. A man _could_ hope.

A man could also fear: Fear that it was the very real strain of knowing that they were the last thing standing between their planet and complete destruction. They were competent, each in their own area, and they worked wonderfully as a team, but Harry was very keenly aware of the fact that their own confidence in themselves was not what it could, or should, have been. Too many of them had joined him on the oil rig with an eye to escaping their very real off-rig problems – problems that seemed to crowd back in under pressure.

Harry used the solitude that he shared only with Truman to regroup mentally. When his boys returned from their night in town, he needed to be his usual, confident self, fully und unshakably convinced that they could do it.

If the boys came back and saw the slightest shadow of doubt in  him, they, and with them their entire mission, would fall apart faster than you could say 'asteroid'.

Truman was sitting at the table, looking not a bit more confident than he felt. What was the man thinking? Did he believe that there was even a minute chance that they could do it? Was he trying to maintain a calm face to keep him, Harry, from falling apart? He wouldn't have needed to bother, really. He had all the incentive he could possibly need to keep his act together.

Once again, he saw Truman reach down and absently rub that bad leg of his that had kept him from going into space himself. Really, as far as Harry was concerned, if he was that crazy about seeing the world from up there, he could have just hitched a ride and come along with them now.

He might not have passed the medical requirements for a regular space flight, but had any of his men? It wasn't like taking along one more physically unfit person would make that much of a difference. Harry would have taken any bet that Truman was more mentally stable than half his men in any case. Too bad the man had no drilling experience or skills at all, or he might have just suggested swapping him for one of his men the next time he mentioned anything along the lines of envying them for being allowed to go up there. Swapping him for A.J. seemed like a brilliant idea at times.

Truman's cell phone buzzed. Harry couldn't read the text from where he was standing, but neither did he need to as Truman commented.

"So the whole world knows."

The man sounded as exhausted as he looked.

Harry exchanged a quick glance with him before Truman turned away again and continued, speaking to the empty room at large.  "Tell me you've never let anybody down before."

He needed to answer that, but he couldn't, wouldn't lie to Truman. Here was the one man he did not need to fool into believing that he fully, unshakably believed in their mission's success.

Still, stating his own doubts was out of the question. Speaking them, making them heard, would make them real. He wasn't a superstitious man, but he dreaded hearing those thoughts put out in the open in his own voice.

"I never quit yet. How's that?"

Every word of that true, so very true. Those words held no promise that he might be unable to keep. He would not quit, and neither would his men. They would succeed, or die trying. If they failed, it would not be because he, or any of his men, had not done their best or because one of them had chickened out while there was still a shred of hope left.

"I guess that'll have to do."

Truman didn't sound happy, but Harry hadn't expected that.

There, in the darkness of that room, they were two men mutely sharing their doubts about the next day's mission and the very survival of their world, both knowing that they needed to emerge from that sanctuary all too soon with their faces reflecting the conviction that everything would be alright, that they would be alright, that the world could yet be saved by their unlikely band of heroes.

Because that was what the world needed to believe, or there would not be any world worth coming back to even if they did succeed.


End file.
